“A beginning of an answer” who go ” in the right direction “. French fishermen, hard hit by the consequences of Brexit, se are congratulated Wednesday November 22 of the extension for six months, announced the day before by Brussels, of the European framework allowing States to help them pay for boat fuel.
At the head of the third fleet of the European Union, they currently benefit from aid of 20 cents per liter. This aid, in force until December 4, could not be extended beyond the year 2023 as long as the European Commission had not itself extended the system allowing Member States to help companies facing the soaring energy prices in the context of the war in Ukraine.
This European framework is extended until June 30, 2024 and the aid ceiling for the fishing sector is increased to 335,000 euros per company per year.
According to the National Fisheries Committee, which welcomed this “beginning of response”professionals now expect the government “the details and terms of the extension of this aid”.
No help for months
Its president, Olivier Le Nezet, greets the “achieved result” by the Secretary of State for the Sea, Hervé Berville, who pleaded the fishermen’s cause in Brussels, but regrets that the particular situation of the companies concerned “is always deeply ignored” by the Commission.
The amount of aid is capped per company, regardless of the number of vessels in operation, which penalizes large shipowners working on the high seas, particularly in Brittany.
For his part, the president of the department of Finistère, Maël de Calan, asks “that government aid be maintained at 20 cents” per liter. He hopes that it can be combined with aid of 13 cents for the use of less polluting diesel announced last September as part of a plan to “green” the fleet, but without a precise timetable.
Mr. de Calan also pleads for “be resolved urgently” the situation of so-called structured shipping companies (companies with several vessels) “who bring most of the volumes to the auctions and who have been de facto deprived of any aid for almost a year”.
Due to the overall annual ceiling set per company, more quickly reached when there are several ships, some like Armement Bigouden in Guilvinec (Finistère), which sent two of its nine ships to the scrapyard after Brexit, had already announced in September that they had no longer been able to receive any aid for months.